Rail gun
A '''rail gun '''is a powerful ship-to-ship weapon used by the United Nations Navy, the Martian Congressional Republic Navy, and Protogen Corporation for space combat. Specs Railguns are large, powerful mass drivers, cannons that use electroconductive rails and the Lorentz Effect to accelerate a dense metal slug at very high speeds, relying on mass and sheer speed to punch clean through ships rather than warheads like with torpedoes. These weapons require significant power (presumably supplied by a fusion power-plant) to fire and must charge briefly before firing. Railguns are typically spinal weapons that require the ship to turn and face the target to aim the weapon. This is the case with Protogen's stealth ships. Larger ships, however, can carry turreted railguns. The MCRN's Donnager-class battleships and UNN's Leonidas-class battleships and Truman-class dreadnought carry pairs of railgun turrets, allowing them to more easily engage targets without having to rotate the ship. Railgun shots are powerful and accurate, capable of shooting clean through even large ships and doing critical damage, shown as they can take down a stealth ship with one shot. However, if the shot does not hit critical components, it will simply over-penetrate, leaving small holes that can be plugged relatively easily such as when Naomi sealed one with an instruction manual and special glue. Still, railguns are used almost exclusively in CQB (close quarter battles) because while the round is quite fast it is unguided and can be dodged fairly easily at longer ranges, although slower ships like the Leonidas-class are easier targets. Because of their short-range lethality, it was considered suicidal to attack a Donnager-class battleship at close range. Ships carrying Railguns Martian Congressional Republic Navy *[[Donnager-class battleship|''Donnager-class battleship]]: 2 railguns * ''Scirocco''-class cruiser: 2 railguns * ''Raptor''-class fast-attack-cruiser: Multiple railguns * ''Corvette''-class fast-attack-frigate: None as standard. One ship heavily modified with 1 keel mounted railgun. United Nations Navy * ''Xerxes''-class battleship: multiple railguns * ''Truman''-class dreadnought: 2 heavy railguns * ''Leonidas''-class battleship: 2 medium railguns Outer Planets Alliance * Behemoth-class dreadnought: 6 bow-mounted heavy railguns Protogen * Stealth ship: 1 internally mounted railgun Laconian Imperial Navy *''Magnetar''-class battleship: multiple railguns Appearances *Possible Spoiler Alert* Railguns first enter the stage on the MCRN Donnager, a Martian battleship, in a CQB battle against an attacking squadron of Protogen stealth craft, taking out the attackers with single hits. The "bandits" then revealed their own rail guns, putting shots clean through even the larger Donnager's hull. One shot penetrated so far into the Donnager that it decapitated Shed Garvey on its way through. At the Battle of Thoth Station, a Protogen stealth ship brought her integrated railgun to bear against Rocinante at point blank range, scoring a hit on the corvette's hull. The shot hit nothing vital but drove the Corvette back into the cover of the station until Amos could fix a thruster hampering the ship's agility. Rocinante later acquired a spinal railgun of her own to further enhance her combat capabilities. The UNN has deployed about half a dozen particularly large rail guns in Earth's orbit to serve as planetary defense platforms. These were used to eliminate several stealthed MCRN nuclear missile batteries aimed at Earth from long range, although one missile did fire before its launcher's destruction and struck a major South American city. Once Fred Johnson recovered and claimed the Nauvoo, he rechristened it the OPAS Behemoth and, as well as installing 170 PDCs and 6 torpedo bays to the hull, had 6 capital-grade railgun turrets mounted to the bow. However, while seemingly an impressive armament, the ship's structure had not been designed to handle such weapons. As such, it was feared that the firing of one of the guns would buckle the entire hull or would cause power failures. The mounting of these guns made the Behemoth the System's largest-ever weapons platform. Known Models Dawson-Pattern Medium Rail Gun A type of turret-mounted railgun used by some UNN warships which cannot be articulated under thrust. The Leonidas-class battleship is equipped with 2 Dawson-Pattern Rail Guns mounted opposite of each on the port and starboard sides of the hull. Farren-Pattern Heavy Rail Gun One of the most powerful and accurate weapon systems available to the UNN, matched only by the most advanced MCRN rail guns and the UNN's fixed orbital gun platforms. The Truman-class dreadnought is armed with 2 turret-mounted high-yield Farren-Pattern Rail Guns mounted opposite of each other on the dorsal and ventral hull. Zakosetara-series Heavy Rail Gun Six railguns of this type were attached to the bow of the OPAS Behemoth. Trivia * A rail gun uses the Lorentz Force, as in it will move perpendicularly or at a right angle with respect to the direction of the current path and magnetic field, to accelerate projectiles. The effect is initiated when a pair of electrically charged rails is bridged with an electroconductive material, like Tungsten for example.HowStuffWorks Science - How Rail Guns Work by William Harris Railgun-8.gif| Railgun-7.gif| * 21st century US Navy testing of Railguns''THEDRIVE'' - Watch the U.S. Navy Test Fire Its Much Touted Railgun By Joseph Trevithick March 23, 2017 employ tungsten projectiles. Should the weapons be deployed, they will use tungsten or depleted uranium projectiles.PROJECT RHO: ATOMIC ROCKETS - CONVENTIONAL SPACE WEAPONS / SECTION 8: KINETIC WEAPONS * In the Expanse series, railguns are sometimes referred to as Gauss guns. This is a contradiction, as Gauss guns are coilguns, which use magnetic coils to propel the projectile instead conductive rails. The name "Gauss" comes from Carl Friedrich Gauss, an 18th-century German mathematician, who formulated mathematical descriptions of the magnetic effect used by magnetic accelerators. His principals are applied to coil guns. External links * http://www.danielabraham.com/2018/03/19/guest-post-railguns-and-plasma-oh-my/ Category:Military Category:Science & Technology Category:Spaceship Armament Category:Technology Category:Weapons Category:UN Navy Category:MCR Navy Category:United Nations Category:Martian Congressional Republic Category:Outer Planets Alliance